Hello, this Gertrude McCluck, and I just wanted to tell you about my latest case.

It all started out when I went to visit my friend, Vern, who is a gorgeous Silver Pied peacock. We were dust bathing together in a yard one lazy afternoon with a couple of other chickens when a bantam hen disturbed the peaceful scene.

"They've disappeared!" she squawked frantically as she fluttered into the yard.

"What's this?" I asked, pricking up my ears. This sounded like a real whopper mystery!

"My eggs are gone again!" the hen sobbed, "Almost every laying hen has had an egg stolen. Some of us are thinking of leaving the farm."

"Have you seen any tracks of skunks or such?" I asked. The hen shook her head.

"Not so much as a hair or track of anything unusual," she sniffed.

I scouted around near the coop's entrance. The thief had not left a track...unless the thief was a bird.

"Aha," I thought, and turned around to the hen. "Do you know anyone here that would steal eggs?" I asked.

"Why would they? And anyway, everybody's eggs are being stolen," she pointed out, then added, "except the turkeys'."

I pulled out my trusty spyglass. Yes! There was the clear imprint of turkey claws. The marks led to a hole in the ground covered with grass behind the barn. Underneath, I found a ghastly sight. In the hole lay a pile of multi-sized and colored eggs, crushed and broken! Cannibalism? Well, you will see. I decided to keep my discovery to myself and marched off to question the turkeys. I returned discouraged, all of them denied thievery.

That night, I returned to the hole to see if I could catch the thief (or whatever it was). At about midnight I heard a noise and saw a broad-breasted turkey emerge out of the gloom with a basket of broken eggs in his beak.

"Hold there," I shouted as I ran from my hiding place. "Where did you get those eggs?" I asked.

"I stole them," admitted the tom.

"Why?" I demanded.

"Because my wife and I can't hatch our own, so we tried chicken eggs," he said.

"Well, it won't work," I announced, "You'll have to get the farmer to help you hatch chicks. Will you steal any more eggs?"

"No, I won't," said the tom.

I went back to the coop and explained everything. I was treated like a hero (well, not exactly), until I went home with a big bag of scratch the chickens had given me in gratitude.

It would have been a tough case for any ordinary chick, but all in a two-day's work for Gertrude McCluck.